Binge Eating Slows Weight Loss in Diabetes Patients

Persistent binge eating interferes with weight loss among individuals with type 2 diabetes participating in an intensive lifestyle intervention for weight reduction, according to a recent study.

For their study, the researchers evaluated 4901 participants from the Look AHEAD trial, which compared intensive lifestyle intervention to diabetes support and education.
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Weight and self-reported binge eating were recorded annually. Based on yearly time points of participants’ binge eating endorsement, participants were categorized as engaging in no binge eating, remitted binge eating, incident binge eating, inconsistent binge eating (2 to 3 years, including baseline), and consistent binge eating (at least 4 years, including baseline).

Results showed that participants in an intensive lifestyle intervention were slightly more likely to report incident binge eating at year 4 compared with participants in diabetes support and education services. Participants with remitted binge eating in intensive lifestyle interventions had lost more weight at year 4 vs those with inconsistent binge eating.

Participants in intensive lifestyle interventions with no binge eating had lost more weight than those with incident or consistent binge eating, and participants with remitted binge eating in diabetes support and education services had lost more weight than those with incident and consistent binge eating.

“Preexisting [binge eating] did not seem to be a contraindication for [intensive lifestyle intervention], although persistent [binge eating] attenuated weight loss,” the researchers concluded. “Patients who report new or ongoing [binge eating] may need additional treatment.”

—Christina Vogt

Reference:

Chao AM, Wadden TA, Gorin AA, et al. Binge eating and weight loss outcomes in individuals with type 2 diabetes: 4-year results from the Look AHEAD study. Obesity. 2017;25(11):1830-1837. doi:10.1002/oby.21975.